Smart phones, tablet computers, and other portable devices incorporating wireless connections to the Internet have opened up opportunities for new, entertaining tourism experiences. These devices are currently used to provide location-aware travel guides to various cities and historical sites. For example, various smart phone apps provide a guide to restaurants, bars, and nightlife in cities such as Boston and New York. Some of these apps use the smart phone's built-in GPS to provide various maps and lists of venues in order of distance from the user's current location.
As another example, Fodor's™ City Apps provides iPhone™ and Android™ apps for a number of major cities, including New York City. The Fodor's apps provide recommendations for sightseeing, restaurants and hotels. Each Fodor's app permits the user to book hotels, restaurants, and entertainment in the particular city, using Expedia™, OpenTable™, and TicketsNow™. It also permits the user to bookmark and create comments about their favorite attractions. The user can download an interactive offline map and reviews, so that the user can browse the map, read reviews, and make notes when in the subway or other areas with poor wireless reception.
It is known to provide preference-aware location-based services, as described in the paper titled “Toward context and preference-aware location-based services” authored by Mokbel, et al published in MobiDE'09, Jun. 29, 2009, Providence, R.I., USA. Such systems tailor their services based on the preference and context of each customer. For example, in a restaurant finder application, the system can use the dietary restrictions, price range, other user ratings, current traffic, and current waiting time to recommend nearby restaurants to the customer, rather than recommending all of the closest restaurants.
Photography is often used to record and share experiences, such as vacation trips, family outings, or seasonal events. Still and video images of such experiences can be captured using image capture devices including camera phones (such as smart phones), digital still cameras, and camcorders. The digital images captured by these image capture devices can be shared by e-mail and uploaded to web sites such as Facebook™ and Flickr™, where they can be viewed by friends. The uploaded images can be printed using on-line photo service providers, such as Shutterfly™. Users can order photo products, such as photo books and collages, which utilize uploaded digital images.
It is known to produce enhanced photo products by combining images captured with connected image capture devices, such as smart phones, and professionally produced digital content related to the area where the photographs were captured, as described in U.S. Pat. No. 8,405,740 titled “Guidance for image capture at different locations”, issued to Nichols, et al.
It is known to use a “geofence” to create a virtual perimeter for a real-world geographic area, such as a boundary around a store, school, or other area of interest. When the location-aware device (such as a smart phone) of a location-based service (LBS) user enters or exits a geofence, the device can generate a notification. The notification can be sent to an email account or another smart phone. For example, a parent can be notified when a child leaves an area defined by a geofence.
It is known to utilize augmented reality in apps running on smart phones. For example, the Aurasma™ augmented reality platform developed by Hewlett Packard (“HP”)™, Palo Alto, Calif. can enable a smart phone to recognize real world images. The real world images can be overlaid with animations, videos, and 3D models to provide augmented reality experiences.
Another known prior art system is “Locast”, developed by the MIT media Lab. According to their website, Locast can be used to create interactive narratives that are crafted by linking together videos and photos thematically, geographically, and chronologically. These stories can be explored by viewers in a non-linear fashion. This MIT group has developed the Open Locast Web Application, which includes a map-based front-end built upon OpenLayers and the Google™ Maps API, that provides an interface for browsing, searching, and interacting with media content. This group has also developed the Open Locast Android Application, which provides interactive content recording/creation, browsing and searching. It supports content synchronization for offline content capturing, viewing and browsing, allowing for use in locations with limited or no connectivity.
However, there is a need in the art for improvements in the above-discussed technologies.